A Tale of Two Berries
by lovelystarz
Summary: Charlotte Berry was a self described wallflower who lived in the shadows of her barely older twin sister Rachel and had done for as long as she could remember. Rachel was the star, destined for great things whilst Charlotte was just that Other Berry girl, content in living a mundane life and helping Rachel towards her dreams. Then Rachel asked her to join Glee club as a favour...


_"__Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination  
>and life to everything." - Plato<em>

6:47 am. Charlotte couldn't help but grimace as she caught sight of the crescent moon shaped bags under her eyes, not even make up could hide away them away. The bags under her eyes were a constant result of the odd hours that she had kept, in the Berry household Charlotte was always the first one up and always the last to go to bed. There had been times when her parents had found Charlotte hunched over her desk as she had fallen asleep in the early hours of the morning whilst reading a book or working on some kind of paper. Charlotte sighed to herself as she looked at her tired eyes in the mirror's reflection before she raised the scissors to her face and carefully cut trimmed her fringe so they were back to the way she liked it; blunt and resting just over her eyebrows. Recently her bangs and had gotten too long for Charlotte's liking, as they were staring to cover her eyes which made it impossible for her to see clearly, however know that she had gotten her hair situation under control, Charlotte put down the scissors and exited the bathroom. As she made her way downstairs towards the living room Charlotte could hear the rest of her family slowly start to get up and begin to start their day compared to her who had been up for the best party of forty minutes and had already showered, dressed and got herself ready for the school day. Upon arriving in the living room Charlotte made her way over to the grand piano that was stationed in the room, the piano that she had first began to play over ten years ago. Taking a seat on the piano stool, Charlotte gently placed her fingers over the keys and after taking a deep breath she began to play. Every morning for the last five years Charlotte did this as it was something that helped her prepare for the day, as there was something very clam and tranquil about the piano. Playing the keys and hearing the beautiful sounds that she was playing helped Charlotte to relax, it was also pretty much Charlotte's life.

Charlotte came from a pretty musical and creative family as her fathers were both fans of the opera, Broadway and singing in general. It was Hiram Berry or Pops as Charlotte called him who first started to teach her how to play the piano. Then there was Rachel, Charlotte's barely older than her by 10 minutes older sister who was without a doubt the real star of the family, always singing and performing with a dream of one day performing on Broadway. Rachel was pretty ambitious and had been the centre of attention ever since both herself and Rachel had been born. Music was an important thing in the Berry family, they preformed together all the time, creating little shows for each other or people in the neighbour hood. Well Charlotte didn't perform as much as Rachel as she preferred being in the background but she took part in the 'family activities' when she was required to. Charlotte and Rachel's parents Hiram and LeRoy encouraged their daughters to embrace their musical talents and spared no expenses when it came to it. For Rachel it was pretty much the performing arts as there didn't seem like there was nothing she could it, Rachel could act as well as sing and dance and had been doing so since she was an infant. Charlotte on the other hand? Her talents didn't quite amount to the same as her twin sister, sure Charlotte could carry a tune in a bucket but she was nowhere as good as Rachel. Charlotte much preferred to play music in particular the piano and the cello but it was the piano that Charlotte had a real love for. It was Charlotte's thing and what she found herself to be good at, had real passion for and it was the one thing that tended to keep her sane at the best of times. Music was something that Charlotte could truly understand, she got music unlike people who were a lot more tricky for Charlotte to understand.

"Lottie? Lottie Rose?"

Lost in her own world it wasn't until she heard her name being called several times in a row that Charlotte looked up from the piano to see her sister Rachel standing on the other side of the piano looking at her in a rather serious manner. No doubt Rachel was worked up about something and had gone quite to a lot of effort to gain her attention.

"Oh hey… Sorry I was in my own world there, what's up Rachel?"

"Lottie you're still coming to my glee audition, right?" Rachel questioned, referring to Charlotte by her nickname. Generally Charlotte detested nicknames, her parents had named her Charlotte for a reason but her family tended to call her Lottie or Lottie Rose, it was very rare that Charlotte was called her full first name by the members of her family. Even though she hated nicknames Charlotte had always been Lottie to them and as such they were the only ones permitted to call her that, to everyone else Charlotte was just Charlotte and that was the way she liked it.

"Yes Rachel. For the tenth million time I am coming to your audition and I wouldn't miss it so you don't have to keep reminding me. I don't think I could forget even if I tried. I am fully prepared for today and I will be there five minutes early if it makes you feel any better." Charlotte assured her sister as Rachel had been somewhat freaking out over the last day or so every since the old glee club director was fired under some suspicious circumstances and their Spanish teacher had taken up the post and was holding new auditions. Naturally Rachel had signed up and had requested or rather demanded that Charlotte accompany her on the piano during the audition.

"Then why did I find the music sheets to my piece upstairs in your desk?! I need my audition to be perfect so that Mr. Schue can see how brilliant I am and see that I deserve the solos." Rachel demanded as she waved a bunch of papers in the air and Charlotte quickly recognised them as the sheet music to _On My Own _from _Les Miserables_ which was the piece that Rachel was going to be performing for her audition. As far as Charlotte knew that the sheet music had been upstairs in the middle draw of her desk, in between a few other scraps of music sheets the last time that she had looked at them which was late last night before she went to bed. But if Rachel had the papers in her hand right now, it would only mean one thing. Rachel had been poking her nose in Charlotte's stuff. Charlotte couldn't help but laugh quietly to herself as she glanced over at Rachel as for twins they looked nothing alike but that was mainly because they were fraternal twins even then they didn't look much alike in Charlotte's opinion. Sure they had the same skin tone, eye and hair colour but that was as far as it went. Rachel was the one with the long flowing locks, the larger then life personality all whilst standing at a rather small 5ft 3 inches. Charlotte was pretty much the polar opposite of her twin sister with her dark which she liked to keep shoulder length at all times, she also stood a further five inches taller than her sister and was the quiet twin. Charlotte didn't like to talk much unless she had to as Rachel pretty much did all the talking for the two of them and then some. Charlotte preferred to be in the background and go about things her own way. Not to mention Charlotte wouldn't go about snooping through Rachel's things.

"Rachel because I am in a good mood I am not going to yell at you for snooping around in my bedroom when you know you shouldn't be doing that. Instead I am going to say that I left the music sheets upstairs because I don't need them as you've been singing Own My Own pretty much since the first time you saw Les Mis and I've heard it enough times that I pretty much have the entire soundtrack engrained into my brain to the point that I am certain that I can play it in my sleep. Relax Rachel I've got this…" Charlotte instructed as she rose from the piano stool and walked over to her sister and plucked the sheets of music form her sister's hand and discarded them on the piano and Rachel immediately looked at her with a guilt expression on her face.

"I'm sorry Lottie, I didn't mean to doubt you or make out you would try to ruin this… It's just that I want today to go perfectly! I don't want things to be like they were before, with me having to watch the solos that I deserve being handed off to people less worthy. I want Mr. Schue to see the star that I am and put my talents to good use instead of Sandy–"

"Rachel I thought we agreed that we wouldn't talk about Sandy for obvious reasons." Charlotte quickly interrupted as she was fully aware that her barely older sister was responsible for the former glee club director being fired from his job because of some unsavory rumors. Apparently they were true but Charlotte was vaguely suspicious that Rachel had reported it to the principal because of Sandy rewarding somebody else other than Rachel a solo. Rachel argued otherwise but Charlotte didn't quite believe her sister as she knew Rachel had quite the competitive edge, had done since the day they were born and would do anything to get to the top and fulfill her dreams of being on Broadway. Charlotte could say a lot about her sister, some of it wouldn't be nice but she could never fault her sister on being ambitious. Charlotte had no idea what she wanted to do with her life, she was very undriven unlike Rachel, another big difference between the Berry sisters.

"Lottie–" Rachel began and Charlotte could see the tiny amount of nerve that her sister was trying to hide but Charlotte could see it her eyes.

"Rachel… Do you not think that I get this after all this time? This is me Lottie, we're talking about. I am your twin sister and if anyone gets why you're doing all of this then it's me. You have a dream Rachel, a big one that you want to achieve and I admire you for that. I won't deny that you annoy me at times Rachel but I know that you are a star, always and forever and I know that your dreams are going to come true because your not sitting on your ass waiting for someone to hand them to you Rach, you are working your tiny butt off to make them come true and they will do. It's not a matter of if you make it big and become a massive star, it's only a matter of when and trust me when I saw you will be the biggest star there had ever been and I will be there every step of the way. From accompanying you on the piano at today's audition to sitting in the front row at your first performance on Broadway. I will be there Rachel so don't freak out about something small like sheet music, you've got this Rach…" Charlotte assured Rachel as even though she was technically the younger sister, more often than not she was playing the role of the elder sister. She was the one who kept Rachel in line most of the time, tried to reign in her sister's diva behaviour. Most importantly Charlotte was the one who gave the pep talks and lifted Rachel's spirits when she was feeling down as their dad's always gave Rachel a glass of water when she was sad which had no real purposes. It was rare that Rachel was really down and doubted her abilities but when she was, it was Charlotte who came to lift her sister's spirits. Sure Rachel was a lot of things, some of them not necessarily good but Charlotte loved her sister regardless and more importantly she believed in her.

"Do you really believe that Lottie?"

"_Naturellement_ and from there on, it is infinity and beyond from you Rachel and I am not just saying that because I am your sister." Charlotte replied in a warm manner adding on a bright smile for added effect as she knew that despite having quite a huge ego for a fifteen year old girl, sometimes Rachel did need to be reassured of her talents and Charlotte would be there to do that, as it was her job to take care of Rachel and remind her of how much of a star she was. If anyone could do this ten it would be Rachel.


End file.
